Timeline for Would covering part of Lake Mead with large sheets of bubble wrap reduce the amount of water lost to evaporation?
Current License: CC BY-SA 4.0
22 events
| when toggle format | what | by | license | comment | |
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| Oct 21, 2022 at 22:38 | comment | added | Mark | @Erik, approximately 80% of the lake's drop in the past year is from more water being drawn from it than is flowing in. Evaporation accounts for the other 20%. | |
| Jun 4, 2022 at 3:51 | answer | added | Rammstein | timeline score: 1 | |
| May 23, 2022 at 19:13 | vote | accept | CommunityBot | ||
| May 21, 2022 at 7:03 | comment | added | Rodrigo de Azevedo | @John Why? Dip the edges 2 meters below the surface. Anchor them to the bottom. Place a balloon lifting the center a bit. As water evaporates, the pressure inside this enclosed space increases, but so does the rate of condensation. I am not claiming that this is easy or practical, but "only way" is a strong word. One could have buoys and a steel skeleton to ensure that the film never sinks into the lake. | |
| May 21, 2022 at 1:02 | comment | added | John | @RodrigodeAzevedo the only way to seal all the sides is to also seal in the water. | |
| May 20, 2022 at 21:26 | comment | added | Rodrigo de Azevedo | @John How so? I read the question. I find your objection incomprehensible. | |
| May 20, 2022 at 21:12 | comment | added | John | @RodrigodeAzevedo which will prevent the function of the lake, a reservoir, nd prevent the function the OP is asking about. | |
| May 20, 2022 at 21:09 | comment | added | Rodrigo de Azevedo | @John Then dip the edges into the lake. Anchor them to the bottom of the lake. | |
| May 20, 2022 at 20:46 | comment | added | John | @RodrigodeAzevedo out the edges, and as the OP mentioned you are not covering the entire lake. | |
| May 20, 2022 at 6:51 | comment | added | Rodrigo de Azevedo | @John How does water vapour percolate through bubble wrap? | |
| May 19, 2022 at 23:18 | comment | added | John | since bubble wrap is transparent is should actually increase evaporation by acting like a greenhouse. but really look a t shade ball for a real solution. | |
| May 17, 2022 at 18:36 | comment | added | JeopardyTempest | Though downwind itself proves hard to find there, given all the terrain... looks like many sites in the area don't have the primarily west wind I'd have expected. So it'd take some real investigation to try to make a guess even on that. And then to make any effort at understanding more complex interactions, like precipitation and wind direction itself... people spend years trying to make a small dent in such questions, and they're still more theory than fact | |
| May 17, 2022 at 18:34 | comment | added | JeopardyTempest | That's an interesting point you remind too, that decreasing evaporation would just be returning towards the historical values. That would quash lawsuits in such a situation? As to how such largescale hydrological engineering impact climate... it's as always a complex and nuanced topic a real challenge to predict or verify (it's hard enough to explain why any particular area has the exact weather it has, nonetheless to explain with confidence what changes something like Lake Mead truly has!) If nothing else, would expect the dewpoint is slightly higher downwind. | |
| May 17, 2022 at 12:10 | comment | added | user23275 | @JeopardyTempest, that's an interesting point you bring up. It makes me wonder now if the creation of Lake Mead had altered the historical weather patterns in northern Arizona and southern Utah. | |
| May 17, 2022 at 4:51 | comment | added | JeopardyTempest | There's also the thought that if significant amounts of evaporation could be reduced over a large body of water... there's the potential argument from other communities that see more droughts that they may be getting less rain because of lower moisture levels in the atmosphere. Other weather modification has spurred quite a few lawsuits through the years, and it doesn't appear everything is settled, particularly on the water rights side of things | |
| May 17, 2022 at 0:19 | comment | added | LazyReader | Maybe but the water would evaporate anyhow less it was sealed. | |
| May 16, 2022 at 21:25 | answer | added | damp_civil | timeline score: 8 | |
| May 16, 2022 at 8:04 | comment | added | Erik | I'd argue that the human water consumption has a more severe impact on the lake's waterlevel than evaporation. | |
| May 15, 2022 at 20:44 | history | edited | user23275 | CC BY-SA 4.0 |
Edited the question and make editing changes to the Body text.
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| May 15, 2022 at 20:16 | comment | added | user23275 | @blacksmith37, you make a good point there. The way I see it is that saving both the water supply and electrical power supply for Las Vegas and other cities in the southwestern States outweighs the possible deaths of some of the wildlife in the area surrounding Lake Mead. | |
| May 15, 2022 at 16:58 | comment | added | blacksmith37 | Covering the water would stop or slow evaporation . But what about unexpected consequences. I cover my pond in winter with styafoam panels. When my son visits with his dog the first thing the dog does is try to walk on the foam panels and fall into the pond. I expect some wildlife would behave similarly. Only one consequence of how many ? | |
| May 15, 2022 at 16:27 | history | asked | user23275 | CC BY-SA 4.0 |